ISPA WINNERS 2021
SINGLE PHOTO
FINALIST
Giacomo d'Orlando
According to the IPCC (the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), the desertification brought about by climate change in recent years has extensively reduced agricultural productivity in many regions of the world, including Italy. Agriculture accounts for 70% of freshwater use worldwide and the current projections foresee the world’s population increasing to 10 billion by the end of the century. We urgently need to find an alternative method of cultivation that is ecologically sustainable for our future. This explains Nemo’s Garden: the world’s first underwater greenhouses for terrestrial plants. This completely self-sustainable project with no environmental impact offers an alternative farming system that’s particularly appropriate for those areas where environmental or geo-morphological conditions make the growth of plants almost impossible. The encouraging results of the last years, during which more than 40 different species of plants have been successfully cultivated, give us hope that we have found a sustainable agricultural system that will help us to tackle the new challenges brought by climate change.
Biography
Giacomo d’Orlando (who was born in 1990) is an Italian documentary photographer who is currently based in Verona. He began career as an advertising photographer in 2011, but in 2015 he decided to move to Nepal and then Peru in order to enter the world of photojournalism. For the next three years, he worked alongside several local NGOs, focusing mainly on social issues. From 2018 to 2020 he lived in both Australia and New Zealand. This inspired him to concentrate on the environment, with particular attention to the possible future scenarios caused by climate change. His work has appeared in The Washington Post, Der Spiegel, El Pais, Geo France, De Volkskrant, D-La Repubblica and Mare Magazin, among others. Today his work looks at how the increasing pressures brought about by climate change are reshaping the planet and how present-day society is reacting to the new challenges that will characterise our future.
FINALISTS
